Good and evil
The major theme of the film is the battle between good and evil. Every five thousand years evil comes to destroy everything alive, it is not interested in seizing power, but simply in complete destruction. The forces of good have to overcome many difficulties and hardship to protect their world, world of people, even though it is not perfect, and Leeloo thinks not worthy being saved, such things as love, friendship prove that to the time they exist people have chances to become better. In this story good and evil stand as complete opposite.
Love
The final scenes of the story show that love is the only thing pure enough to overcome any evil, no matter how powerful it might be. The fifth element symbolizes this feeling, the element which along with nature rules the world. Korben finally has found what he lacked so much – love, perfect love, as Leeloo is nothing but perfection.
Technology and Modernity
The actions in the film take place in a faraway future. The technology of this time is much more progressive than in ours: cars are not moving on the ground but in the air, laboratories have technologies to make from a sell a human body just in few minutes, and people have opportunity to fly to another planet. But this all serves only as the background, even if technologies have been developed greatly, people have stayed as they have used to. They are vulnerable, selfish, seek for power and want to have a better live. Society has not changed at all, as years before it requires strong personalities, not technological devices, to fight for what is important.
